“I’m glad I didn’t evacuate in 1940.”
“You are?” Ivy stared down at her brother, ill and wounded and malnourished.
Charlie lifted his eyebrows. “Aren’t you?”
So much had happened. So many good people lost—Thelma Galais and Demyan Marchenko and too many others. So much oppression and deprivation and fear.
Yet she’d gained friendships and love, and she’d grown in confidence and capability and faith—even in discipline and punctuality. Most importantly, by remaining in Jersey, she’d been able to save lives and relieve suffering and provide a dose of humanity to the oppressed.
“I am,” Ivy said. “I’m glad I stayed.”
“Ivy!” Dad’s deep voice rose from the pier. “Charlie!”
“There they are,” Charlie said. “Dad! Mum!”
Dad stood on the pier in his officer’s uniform and Mum beside him in a dark blue coat and hat, both waving. “Ivy! Charlie!”
A joyous pain squeezed Ivy’s chest, and she waved too, even as the vision of the people she loved blurred before her. She’d longed for this day and dreaded it—dreaded disclosing the news she bore.
A crewman removed a gate at the top of the gangplank, and an orderly approached. “Welcome to Old Blighty, Mr. Picot. Half an hour with your family.”
“Half an hour is more than I’ve had in four years.” Charlie grinned at the orderly and wheeled toward the gangplank.
The orderly grabbed the wheelchair handles. “Not so fast.”
Ivy followed her brother and the orderly down the gangplank to free British soil.
Dad and Mum rushed over, both grayer, but alive and well, and they took turns crushing Ivy and Charlie in embraces.
“You’re so thin.” Mum took Ivy’s cheeks between her hands. “But so, so beautiful. My sweet girl.”
Ivy’s smile quivered beneath her mother’s warm hands. “I’ve missed you so much.”
“Look how you’ve grown.” Dad shook Charlie’s hand and patted his shoulder, and his cheeks worked. “We missed your entire youth.”
Charlie smiled. “Most parents would pay for that privilege.”
Mum laughed and swiped away tears. “Your voice—I scarcely recognize it.”
“Wait until you see him standing,” Ivy said. “He’s taller than you, Dad.”
The orderly cleared his throat. “Let’s move this happy family.”
“Oh yes.” Ivy looped her arm through her mother’s and led the way down the pier to make way for the other patients to disembark.
“A crewman on a cargo boat,” Dad said without contempt.
“He did it for the family,” Ivy said. “To support the practice.”
“It was entirely my idea,” Charlie said. “Ivy tried to talk me out of it. My education, you know.”
“We know.” Mum glanced at Ivy with resignation and sadness in her medium-brown eyes, so like Fern’s. So unlike Fern’s.
“You needn’t fear,” Charlie said. “I am determined to return to school and join the long line of Doctors Picot.”
Ivy spun to her brother. “You are?”
“You shan’t dissuade me.” Charlie waved her along. “I’ve spent the past fortnight in hospital, watching what doctors do, watching what penicillin does. That’s what I want for my life. I want to join the family practice.”
